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In 4 cycle world, bodywork is almost always covering front and rear tires. So starting side by side is safe and maybe make sense (I did not hear any good reasons to do so other than "WKA is doing that").
In 2 cycle, rear tires are always (with exception of rain setup) stick outside of side pods and front tires are always outside of front bumper. So side contacts of 2 cycle karts are dangerous and 99% of all flip overs in 2 cycles happened during side contacts.
So tell me, why is it so hard to put cones in the middle for 2 cycle classes to avoid contact on a start?

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Tag (with exception of EasyKart) and Rotax comes with radiators. Its being rule for ever to let water cooled engines to heat water by letting them to make 1 or 2 full laps. In Barnesville it was always many oval laps before coming to start line. How much seconds will it take from race schedule?

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KidKarts usually very bad with starts. Do not make it worse by letting them stop on a course. We have oval and were able to manage them to go slow together without need to stall engines.

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Green flag. It would be much better if green flag showed not 1-2 yards from karts.
By standing right on a line with cones, you have no chance not to show green flag. Nobody will see what you did.

I could not agree more with all points. Not only do engines have time to warm up but no laps at all in the oval means that a group of karts are going into turn 1 in a group with cold tires, this could only mean trouble waiting to happen._________________Mike Sibley

First race for a new team of people is challenging, and I thank everyone who is helping to run GSKA this year. Ihor made some good points worth considering.

Re: the TAG comment - lap one felt like driving on ice and my fault that I went off in lap one. (..now wasting $ replacing engine mount clamps...!) Luckily there were only 4 TAG's on the track. We had asked for at least one warm up lap prior to the final race but it was not allowed. Yamaha's are much slower and the oval is adequate in my opinion, since the race start is very slow. We'll stick to KT's for the time being, and hope the GSKA will review some of the comments in these posts.

Overall it was a good day at GSKA and should get better as the season unfolds.

mike sibley wrote:

I could not agree more with all points. Not only do engines have time to warm up but no laps at all in the oval means that a group of karts are going into turn 1 in a group with cold tires, this could only mean trouble waiting to happen.

GSKA - please consider Ihor's note below regarding the starts for the 2 cycle due to track width. Here's a shot from the start when someone almost flipped over - one rear tire hit another rear tire and sent a kart into the air. Ihor suggested putting the cone in the middle of the track between the 2 columns of karts - not saying this will ensure accidents don't happen, but will get us further apart from each other at the start and reduce the risk of these types of accidents. Here's a pic of the rear tires hitting when the inside kart slid sideways into the other kart's wheel.
Thanks
Brian

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In 4 cycle world, bodywork is almost always covering front and rear tires. So starting side by side is safe and maybe make sense (I did not hear any good reasons to do so other than "WKA is doing that").
In 2 cycle, rear tires are always (with exception of rain setup) stick outside of side pods and front tires are always outside of front bumper. So side contacts of 2 cycle karts are dangerous and 99% of all flip overs in 2 cycles happened during side contacts.
So tell me, why is it so hard to put cones in the middle for 2 cycle classes to avoid contact on a start?

**
Tag (with exception of EasyKart) and Rotax comes with radiators. Its being rule for ever to let water cooled engines to heat water by letting them to make 1 or 2 full laps. In Barnesville it was always many oval laps before coming to start line. How much seconds will it take from race schedule?

***
KidKarts usually very bad with starts. Do not make it worse by letting them stop on a course. We have oval and were able to manage them to go slow together without need to stall engines.

****
Green flag. It would be much better if green flag showed not 1-2 yards from karts.
By standing right on a line with cones, you have no chance not to show green flag. Nobody will see what you did.

its racing...take the cone out, move the start back to the finish line and let them race to the first turn..lord we've put full bumpers, front nose cones,side pods all that garbage on them to be "safe", race with out all that and than after a couple of trips on your head you figure out hey i cant do that. sorry just venting..

its racing...take the cone out, move the start back to the finish line and let them race to the first turn..lord we've put full bumpers, front nose cones,side pods all that garbage on them to be "safe", race with out all that and than after a couple of trips on your head you figure out hey i cant do that. sorry just venting..

My sentiments exactly... a cone in the middle of the track (or anywhere else at the starting point) is not going to change what happens IN turn 1.

GSKA (and WKA) place the cones as they are to make sure no passing happens before the start point. One less judgement call for the race director to make.

As far as starting at the start/finish... been there done that, it's all fine until someone about 3 rows back forgets what the left pedal is for...